Career Change Is Actually A Leap Of Faith

It's been a rather unusual career progression -- not to mention spiritual journey -- for Gordon B. Mowrer of Bethlehem.

He's gone from insurance agent to politician, back to the insurance business, and after another brief return to politics, once again back to business.

But last Sunday, at 56, Mowrer took perhaps the biggest step of all -- actually a leap of faith. He was ordained a minister in the Moravian Church.

A former Bethlehem city councilman and two-time mayor, Mowrer has been serving as pastor of Advent Moravian Church in Hanover Township, Northampton County, since November 1990, while continuing to study for his ordainment.

Last Sunday's ceremony at Advent made it official.

"In high school I was going to be a minister," says Mowrer, president of the Hampson-Mowrer-Kreitz insurance agency in Bethlehem.

"I was always expected to go into the family (dairy) business I think, but I made a commitment (to religion) back in those days, and it's always stayed with me."

But Mowrer was sidetracked by the U.S. Navy, wife and family, the insurance business, and the forays into politics -- which he sees as similar in many ways to his newest career.

"I think it's that I've always wanted to help people," says Mowrer, who's been involved as a lay minister during his seminary studies, including counseling AIDS victims and other terminally ill patients as an associate chaplain at St. Luke's Hospital in Fountain Hill.

"That's what politics is: you're a servant. I think they're very related," he says of politics and religion.

Though Mowrer made a commitment to Christianity as a young man, his course within that faith has been a searching one, with many twists and turns.

Raised as a Methodist -- "We always went to church on Sunday, there was no choice" --Mowrer became a Presbyterian in the early 1970s, joining Bethlehem's First Presbyterian Church.

"I thought I really needed more nurturing than I was getting at Wesleyan" Methodist in Bethlehem, where the congregation was struggling with decisions over building projects, Mowrer says.

"And Keith Brown, the senior pastor (at First Presbyterian), I liked his warmth, his leadership style. It's a very loving, caring church."

But as the '80s progressed, Mowrer became more serious about his religious commitment, and thought of studying formally, going back to the original from high school.

The Moravian Church beckoned as an outlet for Mowrer's more active role in the faith for a variety of reasons, he said.

"My wife was Moravian; both her grandfathers were ministers," Mowrer says. "Her parents were medical missionaries in Nicaragua, where we got married. So she's the one that introduced me to the Moravian Church," he says of his wife, the former Mary Thaeler.

He liked the basic philosophy, of course, and "I always liked a number of the traditions of the Moravian Church -- the love feast services, candlelight services, holy week ... and the music, the Moravian music has always been very uplifting to me."

When Mowrer decided to forge ahead with theological study, he chose Moravian Seminary because of what he saw as its relatively liberal, open philosophy.

"I wanted to do critical analysis," he says, and to avoid the more rigid dogma -- the kind of "God said it, I believe it, that settles it" philosophy of some denominations. "I wanted to be able to question things. You can do that at Moravian Seminary."

Mowrer agreed that he has tended to forge his own trail, create his own philosophy.

"I'm very ecumenically oriented," he says, noting he served as pastor of Johnsonburg Methodist Church in Johnsonburg, N.J., 1978-79 while he was a Presbyterian.

In 1989, he became director of lay ministries for East Hills Moravian Church in Bethlehem. At that point, he was, at least, a member of the Moravian Church.

"The Methodist church (in New Jersey) had changed to charismatic (philosophy), there was considerable controversy, and they wanted someone who could walk in ... and get both sides to work together," he said.

"East Hills had lost their pastor, there needed to be some healing at East Hills. They were very helpful to me to get started" as a cleric, Mowrer says of the congregation.

But why did they believe that he could help? Why would they trust him, a former politician?

"It really boils down to my love of people; I love and care for people, and people respond to that," he says.

Mowrer believes his extensive and diverse community experience may have helped him gain people's trust.

"You have to agree I've had a diverse life," he says. "I've served as president of the Chamber (of Commerce) and Rotary (Club)," he says of the Bethlehem organizations.